


Realism as Aesthetic, Melodrama as Law: Examining Melodramatic and Realist Conventions in Supernatural

by thisyearsgrrrrl



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Essays, Melodrama, Meta, Other, Realism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-17
Updated: 2013-12-17
Packaged: 2018-01-04 22:15:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1086274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisyearsgrrrrl/pseuds/thisyearsgrrrrl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An examination of realist vs. melodramatic conventions present in Supernatural, and how the negative preconceptions of melodrama create anxiety around ideas of gendered genres.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Realism as Aesthetic, Melodrama as Law: Examining Melodramatic and Realist Conventions in Supernatural

**Author's Note:**

> Special thanks to hamburgergod, eggnogandpanties, and a friendly anon for helping me find examples for this essay. 
> 
> As always, I'm interested in polite and friendly discussion of anything I discuss in my meta. Please feel free to discuss in the comments below.

          Realism is an aesthetic and acting style is unavoidable in today’s entertainment climate. It has come to be synonymous with quality, with film and television programs operating under this convention often hailed as superior to shows that utilize other theatrical forms. Melodrama has suffered under this preconception, despite melodrama being the influence behind how most western storytelling is structured (Gallagher 61). Thus, a conflict comes between stories that use melodramatic forms, but reject the label of melodrama itself; often it would seem in order to avoid preconceptions of gendered genres and the quality of the work, as appears to the case of the television show _Supernatural_. It would appear that in the case of _Supernatural_ , the realist elements are only on the surface of the show acting as an aesthetic style, with melodramatic elements operating relatively unseen underneath. This essay is an exploration of melodramatic modes and methods used in _Supernatural_ , as well as attempts to downplay these same conventions the show relies on.

            Determining exactly what one means by the term “melodrama” is a necessary first step, since the genre, even during the height of its popularity, was somewhat nebulous and especially since as the term has changed in its definition over the course of history as it interacted with other emerging modes and genres. According to David Mayer, melodrama is a “theatrical or literary response” to a chaotic and extreme universe “where suffering is not always acknowledged, and where the explanations for wrong, injustice, and suffering are not altogether understandable” for the characters, protagonists who are often the “helpless and unfriended” (149). Seeking to explain through “emotional rather than intellectual” or psychological terms, we watch their conflicts play out in “reassuring” and “comparatively simple terms of good and evil”  that would have been a comfort to an audience recently separated from the moral centre of their worlds by increasing secularism, war, and revolution (Mayer 149). As such, there is a strong emphasis on victimhood and pathos (Gallagher 62). Having become the “fundamental mode of popular American” storytelling, melodrama can also be as simple as “a form of exciting, sensational, and above all, moving story” (Gallagher 61) and above all “a modality of narrative with a high quotient of pathos and action” (Gallagher 61). As such, melodrama as a mode or narrative style can be translated into different aesthetic types, such as westerns or action films (Gallagher 61). At this point, it is also important to separate realism, a as a specific aestheic and form of acting, from verisimilitude, the “likeness to reality”, or how close what we are watching feels to our everyday life. While wedo not fight vampires or exorcise demons on a daily basis, watching characters have to sew wounds or pop dislocated shoulders back into place demonstrates that the characters live in a world with rules similar to our own. Our perception of what realism is based off of what we think of as verisimilitude, which is also further informed by the context of the content we are witnessing. This is the difference between Legolas’s never ending supply of arrows in _Lord of the Rings_ versus Hawkeye collecting the arrows during the final battle in _The Avengers._ Melodrama has come to be seen as a "lesser" genre, associated with an audience of primarily women and those of a lower socio-economic status, an association that has regelated works that asknowledge their status as such to being seen as "low" art. 

              Before a deeper discussion of melodramatic elements in _Supernatural_ can take place, it is necessary to deconstruct the prevalent aesthetic choices of the show and how those relate to our preconceptions surrounding both realism and melodrama. In early seasons, the creators physically manipulated the show, adding a filter that made presented images appear greyer, creating a feeling and look of “grit” to the show, an aesthetic often associated with contemporary realist style in film.  As the series continued, the filter was removed bringing more vibrant colour into later seasons. 

 

 

  _Fig. 1: Still taken from the “Phantom Traveller” in season one._

  

_Fig. 2: Still taken from “Devil May Care” in season two._

 

 

_Fig. 3:[Fan created image](http://fangirlranting.tumblr.com/post/69910077542/sam-looks-so-different-but-wtf-its-been-9-years). Notice how washed out the actors appear in the season one images, and the greater contrast in light and shadows. The season nine stills have the actors looking pinker, and shadows are less defined._

 

Figures 1 and 2 offers a comparison between the seasons, showing two stills that are meant to be at relatively similar times of day. Figure three is another comparison showing how the filters affected skin colouring and how light and shadows appeared. Not only does the early use of the filter change the look of the show, it provides information on how we are meant to read and interpret the images presented. By using the filters, the creators have signaled that the show is meant to be seen as “realistic” while at the same time physically (and by extension, emotionally) making the film appear darker, hailing the aesthetics of gothic and horror genres. The show attempts to ground the exceptional circumstances of the characters into a “realistic” world in a technique used by action films called “real-isation”: the attempt to create a level of verisimilitude by “anchoring the viewers to a coherent […] world” in order to create realistic universe in which fantastical things can happen (Gallagher 65). At times, the early filter can act both as a signal of realism and to remind us that this is not quite reality, insinuating genres that have grown from the tradition of melodrama. The filter also acts to masculinize the aesthetic of the show by associating it with realism, a more “masculine” style, perhaps in order to mediate anxiety over any femininity in the show. Even on a visual level, the early seasons of _Supernatural_ attempted to achieve this hyper-masculine, realist sense on even the most subconscious of levels. Why the creators of the show eventually stopped using the filter is unknown; perhaps it was simply a change of power, or feeling comfortable and secure in the established parameters of the genre that they no longer felt the need to so explicitly advertise it.

            In his book _Action Figures: Men, Action Films and Contemporary Adventure Narratives_ , Mark Gallagher discusses melodrama and its relationship to action films within a gendered context, arguing that “[despite] their masculinist overtones, contemporary action films formally and narratively follow patterns developed in popular media geared toward women rather than men” (46). Indeed, statistics show that the majority of _Supernatural_ ’s audience are women aged 18-34 (“Ratings”). Long viewed as a “women’s genre,” melodrama provides the “operative mode of contemporary action cinema” by not only utilizing narratives and themes, but also the focus around spectacle as a mode or storytelling (Gallagher 48). Actions films, and to another extent, horror films, rely on violence as a “spectacular visual style, using images of violence to thrill or excite” (Gallagher 47). Along with this emphasis on spectacle, the “rhythm of action, […] performance, and music” all link back to a melodramatic tradition (Gallagher 60). The intense emotions of melodrama are translated into violence on people and their environments (Gallagher 48). In this world, “physical strength and dexterity [become] the solution to social conflicts” and all problems, whether external to the characters, emotional or psychological and be overcome by some form of physical force (Gallagher 60). Interestingly, it appears that _Supernatural_ uses melodramatic problem solving techniques more often than traditional action films. Often, once physical violence has proven ineffective, the characters, and especially Dean, the more hyper-masculine of the two brothers, will appeal to each other’s emotions. Numerous examples exist of characters being able to resist possession and mind control once they are reminded of their familial bond, such as the season five finale in which Sam was able to overcome possession by Lucifer in order to save the day (5.22). Thus, as Gallagher might argue, we can see that the masculine and feminine spheres are beginning to morph into one as _Supernatural_ tries to manage between the two genres.We can extend this to the masculine and feminine modes of realism and melodrama as they begin to intertwine in performance styles. While predominantly appearing to be a realist acting style, Gallagher argues that “performative, exaggerated masculinity” is so exaggerated it can be seen as something outside of common acting techniques, attempting to communicate something beyond character, extending “beyond narrative requirements and beyond the limits of realist convention (Gallagher 65). This hyper-masculine performance and physical is present in both Ackles and Padelecki’s characterizations of the brothers, and could be considered to some extent as a rhetorical gesture, a necessary and integeral part of high melodrama. Another aspect of performance that has been co-opted into film language is the tableau or sustained moments. With the ability to cut between shots, moments of time can become “extended” as the moment of time in narrative is prolonged by technology. Thus, significant glances, reaction shots reminiscent of asides, and moments of extreme tension can be emphasized through film technology, mimicking performance techniques from high melodrama.  The characters also switch between moments of repression of emotion and extreme release, such as in the emerging Romantic melodrama of France from 1830 onwards. This proves to be a more effective method of ellicitng pathos, while also aligning itself to more realist sensibilities of a "seen not heard" method of conveying deep internal psychology.

 _Supernatural_  contains other elements of the melodramatic convention. Melodrama mimics the Victorian ailment hysteria, a condition that is caused by repressed psychological experiences reappearing in the body as physical symptoms (Gallagher 63). In  _Supernatural_ , as well as other television shows similar in genre such as  _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_  and  _Teen Wolf_ , problems or emotions the characters face become manifested externally as monsters that must be slain. This process happens numerous times over the show’s seasons. Notable examples include “Mystery Spot” where Sam is forced to come to some sort of resolution regarding Dean’s eventual death (3.11), and in the episode “Sex and Violence” Dean’s repressed need for connection with his brother leaves him vulnerable to a siren (4.14). The conflict between the brothers is also translated to a cosmic scale. Sam, the brother who rebelled and fled from his father, becomes the vessel for Lucifer, whereas Dean, the loyal son, is the vessel for the archangel Michael (5.08).Their micro conflict is expressed in a macro setting. A psychological  _contrapposto_  is constantly being expressed, not only on an individual basis, manifesting between duty to their family and hunter lifestyle and their personal desire for a “normal” family centering around ideals of domesticity and heterosexual unions, but also in that the brothers each represent the two conflicting points, Dean as the sense of duty and Sam as the self-interested rebellion. Over the seasons, who is beholden to duty and who seeks their personal desire flips between the brothers, showing that while character change and development (a realist token) is present, the melodramatic need for  _contrapposto_  is a necessary part of the framework of  _Supernatural_. It appears that realist methods have been applied to the melodramatic framework of the show, masking its true mode underneath perceived notions of popular performance and storytelling styles.

            Music is an important part of melodrama, and one of the key elements carried over into contemporary film language. During the eighteenth century, music became a method by which emotional and narrative elements could be expressed audibly, creating “mood and atmosphere, [conveying] time and place, or [suggesting] status, ethnicity or class” (Pisani 70) and could also “work at a subconsciously level to make audiences more susceptible to extraordinary situations onstage” (Pisani 70). Music was used to “underscore” and support dialogue and sustained the “emotional pitch” (Pisani 71) and thus music became anchored to emotions (Pisani 75). Often, these scores would be repeated later for dramatic and emotional effect (Pisani 70). While the presence of musical scores is obvious in contemporary television, analyzing one specific and repeated theme, called “Dean’s Family Dedication Theme” or often simply “Dean’s Theme” would help to see how this works on the narrative and melodramatic structure of the show. Unable to avoid the psychology of realism, the theme becomes an important tool in introducing aspects of Dean’s psychology to the audience, using the melodramatic tool to realist ends. The first time the theme is heard is in “Devil’s Trap” (1.22) directly after the brothers have saved their father from demons. It plays briefly, over shots of the brothers driving to a safe house. It does little more than bring down the energy from the high action rescue to the quieter moments that follow. Soon after, though, there is a moment of intense interaction between Dean and John with a high level of pathos in which John praises Dean’s behaviour, the theme playing underneath as they speak. Dean realizes at that moment that John is possessed by a demon, also indicating that the music is a cue that something bad is about to happen, raising the emotional response of the audience. Most importantly perhaps, the music plays underneath Dean stating to John that he doesn’t know the extent to which he will go to protect his family, and the fear that accompanies that (1.22). Thus, in one episode, the music has been introduced and connected to presentations of family, but also as a herald of bad news, that something is imperceptibly off. This imperceptibility becomes important, as it is also often used to underscore scenes of voyeurism. These emotional cues are cemented when “Dean’s Theme” is used in the first episode of season two four separate times. Twice it’s used in its original instrumentation: as John sits by Dean’s comatose body (as Dean watches invisibly and inaudibly nearby) and as John apologizes to Dean for years of horrible parenting (zimshan). Then, the theme changes from a piano to flute. It’s important to note that Dean reacts to the change in his father, just as the audience is being cued audibly by the change in the music. The final instance of the theme is the moment where Sam discovers their father’s dead body, the theme now played with brass instruments creating a fuller and more realized sound (zimshan). Having been used as an emotional indicator for the arch of John’s death, it is used in later episodes to signal high emotions and moments in which the major theme of the show, family, is being discussed. In a flashback, the theme is heard when Sam gifts the present meant for their father to Dean, indicating Dean as his protector (3.08). The necklace, also called the “Samulet”, becomes a symbol for the brother’s tenuous relationship. In another flashback, the theme plays under Dean’s inability to align his hunter lifestyle with normal society, in a moment symbolic of Dean’s choice to always remain on the fringes of society (4.13). Once John dies, the theme becomes projected onto Sam, with moments during season two paralleling moments when the theme was used on John, including Dean watching over Sam while Sam is unaware (2.11), and when the fully-realized horn section (zimshan) is played again when Sam is killed (2.21). In this way, the theme is co-opted and reused to create a commentary on Dean’s psychological development, the techniques common to melodrama working towards creating a more realist character, and how Dean relates to the ideals of family and the “family business” he was raised with. Thus, the theme becomes not only an emotional cue for the audience, but also a cue to Dean’s psychology, fusing realist qualities to melodramatic modes of narrative.

            Despite attempts to add depth and psychology, _Supernatural_ still relies on structures of melodramatic “[villains …] supported in their endeavors by henchmen and women of dubious virtue” and heroes “aided by a range of servants, friends, family members, and associates who are largely virtuous” (Mayer 148-149). Good and evil are often indicated or divided into class structures. In high melodrama, working-class “proletarian characters” became the “chief protagonists” (Mayer 156), along with the emerging “middle-class bourgeoisie” (Mayer 157). Most of the virtuous heroes of _Supernatural_ are from the middle- or lower-classes, working at junkyards like Bobby or in dive-bars like Ellen and Jo Harvelle. Allies include other social “outcasts” like Charlie Bradbury, a computer expert and LARP-ing nerd, Ash, another computer genius and a mulleted redneck, or Andy Gallagher, a lay-about stoner with mind-controlling abilities.  Even the angel Castiel, a long-term ally to the brothers begins as a middle ranking angel whose vessel, Jimmy Novak, came from a job selling radio advertising and a middle-class wife and family (4.20). Villains, on the other hand, often appear as wealthier citizens, much like in high melodrama (Mayer 154). When Crowley, a crossroads demon and sometime king of hell, is first introduced, he sits in his mansion smoking cigars in a well-tailored black suit. Bela Talbot, dealer in supernatural artifacts, when asked how she sleeps at night, replies, “In sheets of silk, rolling in money” (3.06). Evil also comes with high levels of political power, such as season seven’s big bad Dick Roman (James Patrick Stuart) was the CEO of a company, the much sought after position of ruler of Hell. Indeed, Castiel’s brief descent into evil comes as a direct result of his seeking power, becoming the fan dubbed Godstiel (7.01). _Supernatural_ relies on the virtuous characters’ lack of power in much the same way that melodrama does, drawing on the “helpless and unfriended” characters as defined earlier (Mayer 149).

            Despite the clear division of “good” characters versus “evil” characters, the show attempts to resist a clear moral binary, which shows the tension between the realism imposed onto _Supernatural’s_ melodramatic mode. As Mayer writes, “[melodrama] depends on our abilities to recognize evil and distinguish it from good” (150). The realist aspects of the show shy away from truly good characters, and to a certain extent, truly evil characters. All of the good characters have flaws, and often make poor decisions that bring down consequences on them, as opposed to the tradition of high melodramatic in which unforeseen circumstances befall unassuming and helpless victims. Even the evil characters almost all eventually have some aspect of themselves revealed that “humanizes” them to some level. The villain, as in high melodrama, becomes the main source of conflict then, “not just a wicked individual but […] also the bigger problem” (Mayer 151). From the melodramatic tradition came another type of character, one that could demonstrate that the morally conflicted brothers are not so much straddling two separate modes so much as emerging naturally as traditions combined, fused, and grew over time. Later melodramas began to incorporate the “divided hero-villain,” “a conflicted protagonist who, through criminal and frequently dissolute, longs desperately to perform good actions” (Mayer 158-159). The character seeks to overcome his “evil nature” and redeem himself (Mayer 159). This follows Sam’s story arch almost exactly, from his discovery that he was infected with demon blood during infancy to his quest to close the gates of Hell during season eight, a process that he claims is “purifying” him (8.21). Like the characters in a traditional melodrama, the characters in _Supernatural_ exist in a world where they are unaware of the binary imposed on them by melodramatic conventions. The brothers seek a clear right and wrong, but are unable to find it.  Unlike traditional melodramatic audiences, we are not given the privilege of all of the information or equipment to determine the binary for ourselves. Only through the conventions in place to inform us that melodramatic views of morality are present (Mayer 150) and the characters recognising moral extremes can the heroes could be identified as good. The presence of absolute evil, while tempered by humanizing qualities, and the presence of absolute good, as idealized in images of maternal female virtue in characters like Mary Winchester, Ellen Harvelle, and Dean’s brief love interest Lisa Braeden, suggests that _Supernatural_ has complicated the melodramatic morality in their fusion with realism.

            How, then, does the morality of _Supernatural_ translate into a greater social sphere? Unfortunately, unlike similar shows in this genre of television such as _Buffy_ or _Teen Wolf_ , Supernatural does not offer alternative or progressive views on contemporary issues. Like the action film genre it draws from, _Supernatural_ remains at its core a conservative show, “occasionally displaying progressive overtones, the surface narratives […] reinforce[ing] patriarchal structures of white male authority, privilege, and omnipotence” (Gallagher 46) with the “vast majority” of the plot supporting “conservative formations of militant, heterosexual, white masculinity” (Gallagher 46). If _Supernatural_ is a melodrama, then it should be able to offer “brief, palatable, non-threatening metaphor[s] which enabl[e] an audience to approach and contemplate at close range matters which are otherwise disturbing to discuss” (David 148). The strongest and most prevalent topic offered by the show is the examination of masculine affection, both within families and friendships. Evidence of this could be found in the fandom practice of “shipping” and how if characters show the least bit of affection outside of “normal” male interaction there is assumed to be a homoerotic subtext. The show displays this anxiety by often making fun of the brothers’ connection, how other characters often assume the brothers are a romantic couple, and the brothers mocking any sign of femininity, with lines like “no chick flick moments” becoming a phrase, though only used once (1.01), perpetuated by fans in everything from art to .gifs to fan fiction and understood to be an idea central to the brothers’ characters. Melodrama, while presenting a “subversive streak” must maintain these social structures (Mayer 155). _Supernatural_ also follows in this vein, having their virtuous heroes appear counter to society by pitting them against evil creatures that have infiltrated the upper echelons of humanityy, as well as by forcing the brothers to evade the law, escaping police and FBI agents for crimes such as grave desecration and impersonation on law officials, all crimes that are committed in order to kill or destroy monsters. They are able to appear like they are fighting against class struggle and “the man” while creating very little change with the actual systems they are supposed to be fighting against.

            Finally, I would like to discuss how _Supernatural_ depicts its audience in comparison to beliefs about melodramatic and realist audiences. The show is unwilling to acknowledge their melodramatic roots, instead attempting to disguise it by overlaying it with realist aesthetics and hyper-masculinity, as if this would cancel out the feminine origins of the mode they operate in, uninterested in supporting “feminist critics’ recuperation of melodrama” by “challenging its denigrated status as a vehicle for low pleasures and artificial evocations of sentiment” (Gallagher 60). In the episode “The Monster at the End of this Book,” Sam and Dean discover that prophet of the lord Chuck Shirley (Rob Benedict), under the pseudonym Carver Edlund, has been receiving visions of their lives and unwittingly writing the events into a book series that has gained a cult following (4.18). The show presents the fans of the book series, clearly a nod to the real life fans, and introduces the ultimate super-fan, Becky Rosen (Emily Perkins) in the first episode of season five (5.01). She is presented as overly enthusiastic, slash-fic writer with a limited grasp of reality (claiming she knew the Winchesters were real all along when Chuck is forced to ask for her help). While helping both Chuck and the Winchesters, she is often the butt of jokes, and negatively portrayed as annoying, sex-obsessed and unable to maintain healthy boundaries when it comes to Chuck or the Winchesters. Obsessed with Sam (her internet username for her website, morethanbrothers.net is Samlicker81 (5.01)), she eventually uses a magic potion to make him fall in love with her (7.08). In the episode “The Real Ghostfacers”, fans of the _Supernatural_ books are presented as nerdy, immature, and overly critical of the book series and a general nuisance to Sam and Dean. Overall, the portrayal of the fans is a negative one. This could be a sign of the show displaying its anxiety over being connected to melodrama, a genre that has historically been seen as “lesser than” other genres and modes, particularly realism. As it is generally assumed now, realism is the “superior” or “correct” style, and thus any connections to conventions other than realism are generally frowned upon. As such, the biggest indicator of this melodrama-related anxiety is the “femininity” of the fans of the show, using Becky as a stand in for the fans over and over again. By emphasizing the “dress-up” element of cosplay in “The Real Ghostfacers”, and presenting the two characters who cosplay as Sam and Dean in the episode as actually being lovers, not only referencing “Wincest” (the act of shipping the Winchesters) the fans are presented as the less desirable alternative to the hyper-heterosexuality the real Winchester brothers display. Though included as a nod to the real life fans of the show, the overall portrayal is resoundingly negative, showing that while fans can imitate the Winchesters, they are unable to display their hyper-masculine presence, what women want and men want to be like, and therefore somehow less than the Winchesters themselves. These are fans who are fanatical and obsessed, another “feminine” quality that has also been placed onto perceptions of traditional melodrama, something mocked in the lower-class “less sophisticated audience, the general inclination of which, especially among women, ‘[…] to discuss the play as if it had been sheer reality’” (Davis 106), as opposed to a community that also creates and supports works of art and criticism, fan who spend their free time analyzing the show in ways that only critics and film theorists do (and get paid for). As such, the television show seems to be attempting to set itself apart from the stereotyped image fans of melodrama, while at the same time acknowledging that they are performing to an audience with a long standing tradition of femininity. Indeed, the primary audience for the show is women aged 18-34 (“Ratings”). By avoiding this, the show appears to try and align itself with the “superior” and masculine mode of realism.

            Because of these negative and wrongly assumed associations, audiences will often downplay the importance or skill of melodramatic works, turning shows that utilize them into guilty pleasures, especially when the shows themselves present their genre as something to be ashamed off. Melodrama, like realism, has advantages and limitations, and rejecting the label of one because it is no longer in vogue is detrimental to understanding the stories we interact with and interpret. _Supernatural_ ’s treatment of its own genre not only leads to confusion, but also to problematic presentations surrounding gendering and fan identity. 

**Author's Note:**

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> 
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> 
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> 
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> 
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> 
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> 
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